New, New Thirfty Gifty for Christmas and All Ocassions 2011..Santas Challenge...

junior_j

I have spent a lot of today i bed with a cold and migraine! Couldn't eat my Xmas dinner feel a little better now (pain killers and sleep helped)
I think I will try to eat cheese and crackers , just watched eastenders and now about to watch royal family! I aim to make next Xmas perfect in every way! x

fedupandskint

Everything went very well today - christmas dinner was great and all the presents were great too - everyone including me loved all of their gifts

Just having a rest now watching tv with a rather large drink!

Rachel021967

Ate too much, spent too much but all going well until the Barclaycard bill comes through. Husband will probably be made redundant from his very specialised job. So its not going to be easy to find a new one. This Christmas has been good and fairly well organised but expensive. I want a repeat but on the cheap. Looking forward to your experience and ideas to keep me on the straight and narrow.

Rachel, mum to 3 girls aged 17, 14 and 6.

junior_j

Just brought my brother his birthday present (he will be 22 in July) got him a inbetweeners t shirt , reduced to 3.99 on play.com

Tomorrow I will be buying wrapping paper, gift bags , bows ribbons ect only if there 75% off . If its all 50% off only then I will be waiting another day! The cheaper the better! I loved not buying wrapping paper this year! x

Also need to buy a few more Xmas pressies for this year lol hope u all had lovely day , cheese/crackers/ceebrations have gone down nicelly x

Georgiegirl2012

Hi
I've already signed up to the Thrifty gifty money making thread as well as about a dozen others. I'm enthusiastic if nothing else.

I did type out a really long intro to me, but read it back and it was far too depressing. I think it's enough to say that I do have depression which is mostly controlled, but today has not been one of my better days. Most days I'm really positive but I'm tired, the kids are with their dad, I've drunk a bottle of wine, and it's "that time of the month". (The boys are 22 and 19)

So - I'm 43, have 2 adult sons and 2 cats. I am single, and desperately need those cleaning challenges because my house looks like a bomb has gone off in it and then the squatters moved in. And that is after my very feeble attempt at Christmas cleaning. This year I am really really ashamed of myself, and don't want anybody to visit me.

But on the plus side, my brother was very generous and paid for a sizzix machine for me, and my son bought me some promarker pens so I can make some more mess. (the crafty ones among you might know what i'm talking about).

I look forward to getting to know you folks

Anglea

Hi all

I have to laugh.The saga with the envelopes is still not over. The air was blue a short while ago. I've never got into a muddle like this before and can't blame it on drink as I didn't have any!

JJ sorry to hear you were ill. Eastenders and Royle family - I watched them too, some of it was very funny.

Rachel hope it works out well for your family this year.

Elysia and Fedup - glad you have enjoyed it today

Hope everyone else is ok.

There's been a bit of a crisis in my household this week and it looked as though today it was still going to be difficult but things changed at the last moment just as we were going to sit down for lunch, so the day went really well, I'm not going to think ahead.

I

mum2one

SugarSpun wrote: »

Ooh, should I introduce myself too? I'm currently a stay at home mummy to my small girl, who is now 16.5 months old and a rambunctious little monster. I'm organised for this year except the cleaning and setting up/wrapping the baby's gifts because I wanted to wait until tonight to do them. I've also forgotten to ice the Christmas cakes :eek:

On the plus side, I'm already getting a head start on next year's gifts :rotfl:

Doesn't seem like yesterday when we were all waiting for her arrival, time flies xx

mum2one

Hi

I'm mum2one, I'm Cheryl, my dd is known as Miss Hoodie, shes 8 going on 18....shes a little star and one in a million. Theres just me and Miss Hoodie, we live with my parents, so we help each other out in our own ways.

The polite expression I took an extended career break when I had her, but I had 2 car accidents b4 I had her, the damage was only discovered when I was expecting, so I've spent the last 8 1/2yrs on crutches, known as Charlie 1 and Charlie 2... My mum is disabled as well, we make a right pair, shes on crutches now but when she had walking stick, dd was about 3, as it began with w...... need I say more. Middle of a shop Miss Hoodie shouts nanna have you got your w i l l i e ....

I hit the 4...0....... in March... the great plan was to spend my 40th going to Las Vegas, but I felt guilty and am taking Miss Hoodie to Dom Rep for Easter.

I'm studying with the OU, started off as Law, then went to Business now added finance into the mix..... get there eventually. I'm a school govenor, which Miss Hoodie thinks is brilliant as I have an ID badge, and went in for xmas dinner with the kids, luckly they had big tables - there was no way my rear would fit on those benches...!!!

I must say I'm addicted to Halfcost (internet clearance site), and bargains..... my best!! was 2 yrs ago, ordered what I thought was a box of 80 cards from Halfcost (£4.99), but when they came they weren't 80 cards - there was 800...... but they have grown legs and gone walkies in the loft. They should turn up in April, when the loft has to be emptied!!

In need of a good man, then again an ok man would do!!, as long as he can make a good cup of tea, I'll be happy!!

If I was to describe Miss Hoodie - angelic at school, behive at times at home, knows what she wants.... I took her to Tunisia last yr, I'd been to the hotel before and was friends with the one rep and her family, as Miss Hoodie was blonde, and angelic, and the fact we knew the rep, we got looked after!! We did an overnight trip down to the sahara, stayed in a 3star hotel, it was nice, wasn't as nice as where we were, after that Miss Hoodie informed me she will only stay in a 4 star hotel or above, and if she has to fly long haul - it must be first class....... but she says in such a posh way, that she gets away with it. At the moment club penguin is flavour of the month, even more now santa got her 6 mths membership.

A big thank you to my secret santa, I had a gorgeous notebook set, jewellery tray and mini notebook and pen, (my darling mother was seduced by the 3 4 2), and a big thank you from Miss Hoodie she had a beautiful set of 3 creole earrings.

Eylsia2003 - I glad they choose you the earrings, there gorgeous, got Miss hoodie a set, her 1st words - if I lose any at school theres lot in there!

xxx

mum2one

Hopefully everyone has had a good day and `the food, wine etc flowed well.

Thought as the next Santas Challenge isn't till the 24th - thought we could have a little review.

What was your best present?
Tatty Ted toilettry bag from Miss Hoodie


What would you do different next Christmas?
Not let my mother help - she offered to wrap the familes presents - got them all modelled up, dad ended up with a bra!! I got the dogs mug.

Before that she thought she would help bag up the presents - she muddled everyone up!

Try to stick to my original aim of have all presenst wrapped by 1st Dec (that was out of my hands - had the anaphyletix shock)

Cut the xmas list back......... Miss Hoodie will not be buying for everyone in the class - children, the 5 people who come in and read.... (i'm losing my storage shed.....so did me a favour, but wrapping for 131 people not good!!)

What was the funniest / daftest thing of the day?
Mum had a dining room table + chairs for her 65th back in July, we only got it put up Oct, and today was the 1st time we'd used it....... darling mother was a fidget - and the chair kept squeaking, the dog kept moving his head as if to say how much noise can one person make.


If you were granted three wishes what would they be?
Take Miss Hoodie to Lapland - to say thank you for everything she does for me.
I'd fly over the grand canyon
Have the house done up top to bottom for mum and dad, as a thank you for everything they do for us both.

xx

fedupandskint

Santas Challenge
What was your best present?
Hard to say as I liked everything - if pushed my new DAB alarm clock or camera to replace my old one that went wappy and was a surprise from mum


What would you do different next Christmas?
Wrap up in November as I left it all and got a bit stressed out.

Not to leave all the cleaning to Christmas Eve and Day!
Set a budget and stick to it - did it this year but it looked a load of stuff and I couldn't remember if I'd stuck to the budget or not!


What was the funniest / daftest thing of the day?
We had a good laugh at something but I can't remember what it was now!


If you were granted three wishes what would they be?
Do mum's house up as she wants
Buy brother a house
Pay off my debts - ongoing work in progress